Carmen Calvo

Carmen Calvo Sáenz de Tejada (born 1950) is a Spanish conceptual artist, noted for her contribution to the contemporary art of the Valencian Community.

Biography Carmen Calvo was born in Valencia in 1950. In her youth she worked in a ceramic factory, an experience which would later be reflected in her art, which includes fragments of pottery and clay. She studied advertising and entered that city's School of Arts and Crafts from 1965 to 1970. She attended the School of Fine Arts of Valencia from 1969 to 1972.

She held her first individual exhibition in Valencia in 1976, and her second in Madrid in 1977. where she remained until 1992. Since then she has lived and worked in Valencia. Calvo incorporated terracotta into her plastic compositions very early on so that this element would become an icon of her work. In addition to painting, Calvo is known for carrying out interventions, in some cases on a permanent basis, in public buildings.

In the 1980s she received several scholarships, and won distinctions such as the LaSalle Seiko First Prize for Painting and the Alfons Roig Award from the . In 1980 she was one of nine artists chosen to participate in the exhibition New images from Spain at the Guggenheim Museum in New York. In 1982 she also exhibited at the first edition of , the contemporary art fair of Madrid, with the Fernando Vijande Gallery.

In 1990 the Institut Valencià d'Art Modern presented a retrospective on her work since 1973.

In 1995, Calvo created the Lápida-Mural, the result of a competition organized by the Regional Ministry of Public Works of the Valencian Community, for on metro Line 3, a project by Carlos Meri and .

She represented Spain with a gallery of mirrors at the Venice Biennale in 1997, together with the Catalan poet Joan Brossa. In 2003 the Museo Reina Sofía dedicated an exhibition about her work. From 2 December 2016 to 29 January 2017, her exhibition Carmen Calvo. Todo procede de la sinrazón (1969–2016) was held at Sala Alcalá 31 in Madrid.

In 2013 she received the National Award for Plastic Arts from Spain's Ministry of Education, Culture, and Sports,

She participated in the Official Section of the 2018 PHotoEspaña Festival with the exhibition Quietud y vertigo.

Feminist themes have been prominent in Calvo's work,

Awards LaSalle Seiko First Prize for Painting, Barcelona, 1985 Alfons Roig Award from the , 1989 Medal of the Faculty of Fine Arts of San Carlos de Valencia, 2009 National Award of the Spanish Association of Art Critics (AECA) and to the most emblematic work by a living Spanish artist, 2012 (ACCA) Award, 2013 National Award for Plastic Arts, 2013 Carmen Alborch Award, Socialist Party of the Valencian Country, 2019